Tetryl initiation behavior

Included in this section are the steady state detonation properties of Tetryl. Initiation behavior will be treated in Section VII Detonation Velocity and L VD According to Cook (Ref 17) the ideal detonation velocity of Tetryl is given by ... 

Because Tetryl was widely used as a booster charge, its initiation behavior has been studied extensively. In particular, the reaction of Tetryl to shock has been the subject of many investigations. We shall now summarize the initiation characteristics of Tetryl with emphasis on its shock initiation behavior. The transition from burning to detonation will be described in the next section... 

Scott (Ref 41) also investigated the effect of cooling Tetryl on its shock initiation behavior. Confined and lightly confined charges at 1.47 g/cc and 0.100 inch diam were found to have the following pressure thresholds ... 

Addition of 3% wax to 470 micron Tetryl at 66.5% TMD increased from about 70mm (no wax) to about 240mm. This is a much greater increase than observed for waxed and unwaxed RDX. Furthermore, addition of wax apparently changes the initial low temp decompn behavior, observed in pure Tetryl, into behavior typical of other expls, in that accelerated burning in waxed Tetryl starts sooner (further away from the onset of detonation) than in pure Tetryl... 

Abel (KI) Test at 65.5° — 60+ minutes Behavior Towards Sulfuric Acid. When 2 drops of coned acid were allowed to touch ca 5mg sample placed in a test tube, a slight flash and a rather loud pop resulted Brisance by Sand Test. 0.2g being initiated by 0.24g MF plus 0.15g Tetryl crushed 29.5g sand, which is somewhat above that crushed by 0.2g Tetryl... 

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